No abstract

This study focuses on the potential role of technical and institutional innovations for improving water management in a multi-user context in Burkina Faso. We focus on a system centered on three reservoirs that capture the waters of the Upper Comoé River Basin and servicing a diversity of users, including a sugar manufacturing company, a urban water supply utility, a farmer cooperative, and other downstream users. Due to variable and declining rainfall and expanding users' needs, drastic fluctuations in water supply and demand occur during each dry season. A decision support tool was developed through participatory research to enable users to assess the impact of alternative release and diversion schedules on deficits faced by each user. The tool is meant to be applied in the context of consultative planning by a local user committee that has been created by a new national integrated water management policy. We contend that both solid science and good governance are instrumental in realizing efficient and equitable water management and adaptation to climate variability and change. But, while modeling tools and negotiation platforms may assist users in managing climate risk, they also introduce additional uncertainties into the deliberative process. It is therefore imperative to understand how these technological and institutional innovations frame water use issues and decisions to ensure that such framing is consistent with the goals of integrated water resource management.

No abstract

No abstract

The Boston Water and Sewer Commission (the Commission) has conducted a comprehensive assessment of pollutant loadings from its closed conduit and open channel drainage systems to the receiving waters of the Charles River, Neponset River, and Boston Harbor. A uniquely detailed Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Storm Water Management Model (SWMM) computer model was adapted from an existing system-wide 4,000 node hydraulic model and used to assess sources, loads, and mitigation alternatives for 13 pollutants discharging from the city's drain systems to its receiving waters. The model is calibrated to baseflow and stormwater runoff observed throughout a five-month flow monitoring program, water quality data obtained at 20 sites over six rainstorms and six dry-weather sampling events during the flow monitoring program, and historic data. The model has been used to assess the potential of improved best management practices, green stormwater infrastructure implementation, and low-impact development practices for meeting total maximum daily loads (TMDLs) and water quality standards. The model simulates pollutant buildup and washoff across nine land uses as well as contributions from groundwater, illicit flow, and rainfall. It simulates pollutant conveyance through open and closed conduit systems, first-order decay of oxygen demand, bacteria die-off, bacteria resuspension from sources in sediment bed load and pollutant removal through natural and constructed detention/treatment systems.